Character information is used as a basis for one of the conventional methods for delivering and storing information. In recent years, a person who wishes to generate a desired document will use a document making apparatus such as a Japanese language word processor, or an English language word processor, or a personal computer having a function as word processor. The prepared document can be transferred through a network, or stored in a storage medium such as a magnetic disk or an optical disk. This practice has become very popular because highly sophisticated document making apparatus has been realized with low cost. A further basis for such popularity is the change in the working environment, such as the tendency for a paperless environment in offices, the consolidation of communication networks, and the popularization of electronic mail.
Also, as other methods of delivering and storing information, there has been known a method of using voice information, or a method of using voice information together with image information. For instance, in the method of using voice information, information delivery is executed by directly transferring the voice information through a telephone line or the like, while information storage is executed by using a recorder and recording the voice information in a tape or the like. Also, in the method of using voice information together with image information, information delivery is executed by transferring the voice information and image information with a communication device having a monitor and a speaker, while information storage is executed by using a recording device such as a video device and storing the information in a video tape, optical disk, or the like.
Of the methods for delivering and storing information described above, the method of using character information needs a smaller quantity of data and is easier in editing information as compared to other methods. Further, the character information can be used as digital information on a computer system, so that the range of its availability for various applications is quite broad.
However, in the method of using the character information based on the conventional technology, information in a prepared document is limited to visual language information (namely, character language information), so that emotions or the like, which is non-language information, cannot be added as information thereto. It should be noted that, in a case of language information using a voice (namely, voice language information), emotional expressions which are non-language information can be added as information by changing a "talking way" such as the accent, velocity or pitch of a voice or the like.
Also, the conventional technology did not provide an apparatus for or a method of making information in which two types of information, each having a different expression form respectively, namely character information and voice information, are combined with consistency.
Also, voice information is generally edited by using the auditory sense (namely by hearing a reproduced voice with the ears). Thus, it is necessary to check a position of desired voice information by reproducing each information. As a result, such effort is disadvantageously complicated and troublesome.
It should be noted that, although a voice can be synthesized from a text document (namely, character information) by using the text voice synthesizing technology, which is one of the conventional types of voice synthesizing technologies, there are some problems such as misreading a proper name not listed in the dictionary or pronouncing the proper name with the wrong accent. Further, there are problems such that emotion or the like, which comprises non-language information, cannot be expressed, or that a voice cannot accurately be synthesized with a talking way intended by a person who makes a document.